So, we picked her up yesterday at about 5.30. Long chat with the vet, bore away powdered antibiotics, and liquid painkillers, so no pilling. Hurrah! We drove home carefully, and decided to take her straight upstairs in her carry basket, so that she could emerge in her own time, and be quiet. And before we turned round, she’d lurched off along the landing like an extra from World War Z, down the stairs, and onto one of the big red beanbags, where she settled for quite some time. Ron was wary, Mustrum just said “Oh, Lily’s back” and Henry was really, really unhappy; I guess she looked like Lilith, but smelled wrong.

During the course of the evening, she went into the tube on the cat tree, into a couple of boxes of DVDs awaiting collection, into a basket of Stuff, into an empty cardboard box, and onto the other big red beanbag. In passing, she snarfed the remains of our smoked salmon omelettes, before eventually settling on my lap, having rejected Pete’s first.

She had some tinned tuna for tea, laced with antibiotic, then accompanied us up to bed, where she slept on my pillow all night. I, however, barely slept at all, because she is wearing a cone, and every time she moved, she disturbed me. And it was Too Hot. Tonight, she’s going in a dog cage, so we can all get some rest.

This morning, she remained on the pillow after we got up, then took herself off downstairs and used her litter tray (we put out a shallow one for her), scattering litter everywhere. But still, this is good. And then … she vanished. One moment there, the next gone. We called, we checked everywhere, we panic’d a bit. then Pete got the big ladder from upstairs and spotted her in next door’s yard. Which means she gone across the tool shed, across the log store, across the other log store and onto the bike shed roof, before going over the wall.

We wondered what to do. Far too hot to shut all the doors. So we decided to check whether she could make it back. I made the call that brings the Tribe home for treaats: “Iggeeeeee”. And over the wall she came, and was rewarded with tuna, and Sheba, and painkillers and antbiotics. Since then she’s been slumped on the back of the sofa, on the beanbag, in the bedroom doorway, and is now under the bed, draped over the Roomba. No, we don’t know why. We guess she’s mending 🙂

Back to the vet on Thursday for a wound check, and then again in a few days to have the stitches out. I honestly think she finds the cone more irritating than her missing leg; she’s a pragmatic and courageous little beast. Here’s the bill so far. Ouch. But the alternative would be no Lily, and what use would that be?